Little meaningful academic learning happens when students’ prerequisite needs go unfulfilled. I often cite the work of psychologist Abraham Maslow in these matters. His famous Hierarchy of Needs explains that cognitive and aesthetic needs (those addressed by academic instruction) can only become ripe for fulfillment when more fundamental needs are met. Assuming that schools see [...]
The best teachers lead classrooms not merely by teaching but by facilitating. They not only create learning experiences; they also create circumstances for learning experiences to come about in various forms. Even better, they create environments that sustain learning on their own. Or perhaps the phenomenon is not as spontaneous and magical as it sounds. [...]
Students represent the most overlooked resource not only in a typical school, but in most communities at large.
By the time I was nine years old, I knew that Hank Aaron had hit 755 career home runs, that Ty Cobb had a lifetime batting average of .367, that Roger Maris had belted 61 home runs in 1961–a single-season record. I knew which baseball teams were in which major league, and I knew for [...]
New Jersey’s legislation remains silent on the history, framework, mechanisms, psychology, sociology, pathology, intentions, and currents of influence of the very media that most directly and pervasively affect the lives of young people.
Originally posted on Open Salon on June 21, 2012: Some months ago I wrote about Melanie, a schoolmate of mine who was bullied mercilessly decades ago when we were in the sixth grade. Much of the abuse took place on the school bus, and I wrote about my role as an inert bystander who failed [...]
Originally posted on Open Salon on May 24, 2012: Some time ago I completed a master’s degree program in school administration at Rutgers University’s Graduate School of Education. Shortly thereafter, I received a certificate making me eligible to be a principal or assistant principal. Since then, I have had a few interviews for jobs that [...]
Originally posted on Open Salon on February 22. 2012: “Kids today!” This hackneyed exclamation has been around for generations, and people of every generation think they invented it. “Our parents didn’t let us get away with things like that!” This is probably true. “My father used to take his belt to me!” I think the speaker [...]
Originally posted on Open Salon on October 13, 2011: In sixth grade, I did perhaps the worst thing I could have done to or for another person—nothing. That person was a schoolmate named Melanie, and the memory of what I saw her endure that year haunts me to this day. Melanie was not ugly or [...]
Originally posted on Open Salon on July 25, 2011: I have not posted in some time, as I’ve been away for several weeks due to illness and travel. I’ll use this post to tell a brief story whose moral is that we all ought to set some limits for ourselves. I had a week off [...]
Real Teaching 